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The Shepherds

A Concert To Remember

By Peder EideGuest Writer

CBN.com 
The life of a shepherd was 24/7. Sheep all day and all night.
A baa baa here, a baa baa there everywhere a baa, baa. You get the picture.
It was also a very lowly position in the social class. Near the bottom.
It was a hard, long monotonous, occupation and something you did because
it was what your family had done for generations -- tend sheep.

In any nativity scene I see during the Christmas season, I always look
for the shepherds because their introduction to the King of Kings and
Lord of Lords was so dramatic. I mean, imagine being in the field where
you have been gazing across the same scenery, listening to the same
sounds, smelling the same odors (use your imagination), for days weeks,
maybe months. Then all of a sudden, in the middle of the night your
mundane life is interrupted by a blinding light surrounding an angelic
being who is telling you,“Be not afraid.” (I appreciate
those words because I would probably be losing it right then and there.)
Then, the angel exclaims: “I bring you tidings of great joy! Christ
the Lord had been born! The Prince of Peace! The Messiah is here!”

I wonder how it connected with those shepherds.

Did stories of prophecies and promises that they had been told by their
elders and even told to their own children race across their minds?
Did the dots start to connect? What emotions were welling up in them?
Could the very thing they thought they would never get to see or sometimes
doubted even being true be unfolding right in front of them?

To top it all off in the midst of this overwhelming moment, a thousand
angels appear and sing “Glory to God in the highest and peace
to men on whom God’s favor rests.” That had to be one amazing
concert.

Something felt fulfilled. Like when your dad promises to take you fishing
in 2 weeks and for 14 days you wait, trust, hope, and anticipate the
coming moment to hear your dad say “Let’s go fishing!”
Right then your heart goes “I knew it, I knew it would happen.”
It’s an affirmation of the love you always knew was there.

In one of the songs I co-wrote for my Christmas CD, my favorite line
is, “God has assembled all those who have wept, He promised His
promises all will be kept.”* The shepherds were now tasting the
goodness of God keeping His word.

They had to go see Him! I think they ran. They couldn’t wait
to see. The sheep could wait. Their hearts could not. Their hope was
renewed. Their world was going to change, and at the same time, their
lives were already changing.

And after these simple sheep herders had gone and visited the first”Nativity
Scene”, they went and told everybody what they had seen and heard.
Why? Because they knew it was true. They had experienced it first-hand.

Those lowly shepherds displayed the qualities we should aspire to --confidence,
courage, peace, passion -- all because a Heavenly Father showed His
love by sending His Son to live, walk, talk, die and rise again so that
we might have life!

Why? Because God always keeps His promises.

This passage was inspired by the song “Love Has Come” featured on the
CD, Christmas Come On In by Peder Eide.

Praise & Worship leader Peder Eide’s new “Taste
Worship” events coincide with the release of his new, critically-acclaimed
CD, Taste & See. His “Taste Worship” events are highly
interactive experiences that strengthen families in a worship lifestyle,
helping families discover creative ways to live out their faith together.
Peder and his wife Sherri have four children of their own all under
the age of 10, with their most recent addition being a little girl they
adopted from South Korea.